Sweet Rosie, safe and healthy and playing with a catnip toy

Rosie was a very sick little cat when we found her on one of the coldest days of the year.

Now, she is a playful and happy 1 year old female cat. Her foster mom Ruth has done a fantastic job, and she is ready to be adopted!

Rosie's adoption ad is HERE

More videos of Feather and Shadow!!

Feather and her sister Shadow are available for adoption. To see their ad, click HERE

Cookie and Scout

Cookie (siamese cross) and Scout were two of the dumpster kittens that were rescued by Carol, one of our board members, back in October. Cookie and two of his siblings were literally dumped in a nearby dumpster, and Scout was the slightly older kitten who was standing beside the dumpster, pleading for help for the kittens. We guess that they came from the same home, and might even be siblings. Carol fostered all four kittens. We found homes for Scout's two siblings within days of their rescue, and they went off together to a happy ending. Cookie and Scout have stayed at Carol's much longer, but they have now been adopted together by one of our feral team members, Sandra. We are so pleased that they will stay together.

-Sarah

Postcard from Pugsley

Some of you might recall a favorite photo of some rescued baby kittens, two orange, and one white. They were trapped and fostered this fall after being born in a broken down garage in North Central Regina.

Pugsley was the personable orange male tabby kitten, and he was adopted by a wonderful family who wanted a friend for their other cat Forrest. As you can see, Pugs is doing well, and has bonded with his new buddy. We love hearing from our adoptive families!

-Sarah

Spaz has landed well!

Spaz the three footed kitten has been adopted by Jody, one of our dedicated board members. Yay! Spaz is already tearing around his new home, trying to make friends with Pumpkin and Sammy, the two other resident felines, and bonding with his new mama. He's come a long way from the sick little kitten that we found on the verge of death on one of the coldest days of the year. And, as his foster mom, I am so thrilled that Spaz has been adopted by a dear friend, so that I can get regular updates and visits.

-Sarah

Jake, all settled in

Jake is a young male tabby cat who had been living at one of our feeding stations in North Central Regina for many months. We were able to scoop him (literally! One of our volunteers won his trust and picked him up!), assess him, and take him into foster care. Jake is a tame cat who somehow became homeless. He was already neutered and tattooed, so we tried to reunite him with his original family. However, several weeks after we have tried to connect with them multiple times, they are still not returning our messages. It seems that Jake is no longer wanted by them. Thankfully, we want him, and we want to make sure that he is never cold or hungry again. Jake was timid at first with his foster mom Pat, but he is thriving now. He has remembered what it means to be a housecat, and he is taking over. Once Jake has had a bit more time to recover and gain strength, we will be listing him for adoption.

-Sarah

Happy Little Minnow

Minnow was rescued last summer, with a horribly burned and infected mouth. She was also pregnant, homeless and starving. After being spayed, receiving medical care and antibiotics, Minnow was moved into foster care, where she thrived. Minnow was in foster care for SEVEN months - one of the longest waits for a forever home we have ever had in PFA. I was Minnow's foster mom, and I adored her. The only thing that kept me from adopting her was the fact that she clearly would prefer a home with a few less critters, as much as she did cope admirably well with all of mine, including the chihuahua.

Minnow was finally adopted a few days ago by a former co-worker of mine, May. The photo above was taken in her new home, where she is obviously loving being in a one cat home with an incredibly kind person who adores her. Thank you to May for giving our little girl a chance.

-Sarah

Lovey takes a bath

Lovey is a sweet little black and white Manx kitten who was rescued from one of our feeding stations in North Central Regina last week.

Like many Manx kittens, Lovey has minor problems defecating, which results in a pretty messy little bottom on occasion. Lovey needs to be washed regularly. Her foster mom Sandy documented Lovey's most recent bath, above!

Lovey will be ready for adoption in about a week. She is a round, happy little girl whose personality and love is well worth the occasional work of a bath.

-Sarah

Shadow and Feather playing

Shadow and Feather are the last two 10 week old kittens waiting for adoption from Girly's litter. Girly was the sweet momma cat with 6 babies that we rescued from underneath a house last month.

Girly has now been spayed and is waiting for adoption at a new foster home where she can be a single girl on the move :)

Shadow and Feather have been the last to be picked because they are black kittens. However, they are wonderful, bright and healthy little girls who deserve fantastic homes.

To see Feather and Shadow's adoption ad click HERE

The Robinson St kittens

Lucy

LOVEY - the Manx kitten

LOVEY

DOVEY

On our new Feral feeding route in North Central Regina, we are finding many desperate situations that need our help. We began feeding a momma cat and her four babies, and are now working on trapping the entire family and moving them into foster care at Sandy's, one of our awesome kitten-taming foster homes. So far we have three of the kittens. The feral team is doing their very best to get the remaining kitten and the mother, braving this horrible cold and snow!

-Sarah

Our statistics for 2008

We just compiled these stats from our 2008 adoption documents. It is impressive, and we wanted to share!

In total we rescued 260 cats and kittens in 2008, and 85 sterilizations were performed!

If you are wondering what happened to the cats that were not sterilized, the bulk of them would have been kittens; we did rescue a number of already sterilized cats; we re-housed many cats who were already owned and needed new homes (though we've subsequently stopped doing that due to the desperate need to save the street cats); and we did adopt out a handful of cats that were of age to be sterilized. This only happened though when funds were non-existent, and to people we were 100% sure were going to have it done asap.

Also included in those statistics were approximately 10 cats which were subseqently euthanized shortly after rescue, due to already present disease. We are especially grateful to have found these poor dear souls.

We are so grateful to our members, volunteers, foster homes, and supporters who all played a part in making this possible. Just think of all the suffering we have prevented, through the rescue of strays, and the prevention of births to strays.

**this does not include the many sterilizations of feral cats who were subsequently re-released to the colonies

-Carol

One of the challenges of finding homes for rehabilitated cats

Many of the cats and kittens that we are trying to find loving homes for have been rescued from a hard life on the street. Kittens that we rescue have often never been touched by human beings before. We find that as long as we are able to foster them before they are about 12 weeks old, they can be socialized into loving and secure housecats. However, this transition takes time, and even once they are socialized, they can be timid with strangers for some time to come.

This timidity with new people presents an obvious challenge to adoption. Prospective adopters come to a foster home to meet our cats or kittens, and are faced with an animal that runs and hides, or clings to their foster parent, or even hisses!

In our experience, once such a cat is taken home, they quickly acclimatize and learn to trust their new family.

One example of cats like this are Jinx and Coal. These 5 month old boys were rescued with their mother, Clover, and two other brothers early in the fall. Clover has been adopted, and the two other brothers are also in foster care. Jinx and Coal are ready for a new home, and their foster mom Laurie has done two videos so that people can see how incredibly sweet and loving they are.

To see Jinx's video, please click HERE

To see Coal's video, click HERE

Two brothers saved, two months apart

ROCKY, WARMING UP

As many regular readers might recollect, we rescued a sweet 10 month old male cat from the streets of north central Regina back in November. Charlie was one of two black male kittens adopted last summer by a family across the street from me (definitely NOT from us!), and when fall came they were kicked out to fend for themselves. Charlie quickly figured out that he could get help at my house once it got cold, and I rescued him on a very cold and rainy night. I tried to return him to his original home and was told in no uncertain terms that they were done with the cats. Charlie is now in a lovely foster home with Kelly and her two cats, and we continue to try and find him a great forever home.



To see Charlie's adoption ad, please click HERE



I have kept an eye out for Charlie's sibling since then. In my backyard I have a feeding station and shelter set up for two feral cats, and in the last few weeks I noticed a young black cat hanging about as well. Well, yesterday I went out to top up the food and the water in the heated water dish, and checked the insides of the two shelter boxes, to see if they needed more straw added to them. I opened the lid of the first box, and there, blinking calmly at me, was Rocky! He let me stroke him and pick him up, and so we visited for a while. I took a chance, and ran into the house to grab a carrier and some stinky wet food. I came back out to find Rocky waiting for me in the shed, opened the door of the carrier, put the wet food inside, he walked in to eat, and I closed the door.



Rocky is now contentedly snoozing in my house and he is booked in for a neuter on Wed. We'll foster him, just like Charlie, until he too can be assured of a happy ending with a loving family.

-Sarah

Rescued from being hunted by coyotes, now a happy house cat

The contented striped tabby cat pictured above was one of the three "Paintball kittens" that we rescued from an outdoor paintball facility just outside of Regina two months ago. Buster (above), Beatrix, and Bella were starving, dehydrated, chilled to the bone, and prey for coyotes. Pat and Bob succeeded in catching them, and we fostered all three.

Buster was adopted by the family of Alana, our wonderful web designer. Alana emailed this photo to me today with the following note:

"Thought you would like to see how Buster (well now known as Wally) is doing. He's doing great and he loves his new "room mate" Tika. I've attached a picture for you to see. He loves sitting by the nice warm fireplace and looking out the patio doors at all the birds that are around Sorenson beach where my parents live."

Bella has also been adopted by a caring young man, but Beatrix is still waiting. To see her adoption ad, please click HERE.

-Sarah

Spaz the three legged cat in recovery

Spaz is a 5 month old male cat that was found in downtown Regina, suffering from a horrible upper respiratory infection. He is also missing his right hind foot. I took Spaz into foster care for People for Animals, and it turned out he also had a really bad viral infection that caused lesions on his mouth, his eyes, and his nose. After three days on IV at the vets last week, Spaz is on the mend! He is a wonderful, loving little guy who likes to sit on shoulders, and is friendly with everyone. Spaz will be placed up for adoption at the end of January, when he is healthy enough to be neutered. He will make someone a wonderful pet.

-Sarah

Caramel is a happy girl

Caramel was abandoned outside of Regina on the side of the highway. She was found by a kind local resident, starving and cold. They contacted us, and brought her into the city, where we had Caramel spayed, vaccinated, and placed in a loving foster home. Caramel was timid at first, after being through so much, but within weeks she was fearlessly walking between the legs of the four dogs at her foster home, and snuggling with everyone in the family.

Caramel was adopted by one of our wonderful pet Rescue volunteers, Brittany, and her boyfriend Bobi. She joins their young male cat Rocky, who has adapted quickly to his new fur-sister. That's Rocky sharing his mom's lap with Caramel in the top photo, and Caramel warming up Brittany's lap on her own in the second photo.

-Sarah

Enter a contest to help PFA!

Please click HERE to enter the Hotel for Dogs contest.
You can win a Dinner for you and 10 of your friends, and PFA can win $500.

New Year's Day in my kitchen

I have a very full house right now. Normally, as the foster home manager, many of our rescued cats come through my house for a short spell and are then taken to a foster home. However, with the very cold weather and the holidays upon us, there was a bottleneck of sorts, and the last three new rescues have all stayed and stayed and stayed. So, right now I have 7 foster cats, along with my own 6 cats and very tolerant dog.

Everyone always asks "How do they all get along?" and are surprised when my answer is that they all do just fine. My own pets are very used to new arrivals - and any newcomer is isolated in the "fostering room" downstairs for at least a week to make sure that they are healthy, so everyone smells and hears each other ahead of time. I think that the rescued critters are so glad to be warm and well fed that they quickly put aside any territorial issues. And, of course, everyone is vaccinated and sterilized, and I have SEVEN litter boxes. Thank goodness for basements.

This morning as I fed everyone breakfast, I stood back and was so thankful for the work that PFA does. Each happily munching cat has a sad story:

*Minnow, who was found with a severely burned and infected mouth this summer

*Mickey, discovered in the cold last week with a huge wound on his back leg

*Shadow, rescued by our feral team this month, dehydrated and freezing

*Bugsy, suffering from a badly infected eye that needed surgery (now adopted by me)

*Baby Girl, struggling to feed her babies and herself

*Star and Emma, two of Baby Girl's kittens

*Pasha, another starving momma cat on the street (now adopted by me)

*Oscar, Pasha's now grown son (also adopted by me)

*Frankie, who was a teeny kitten fending for himself in North Central (adopted by me)

Most of these cats would have most likely suffered and died without our intervention. They are such blessings to us!

Happy New Year, from everyone at my house.

-Sarah

(PS - we are always looking for more foster homes, if you would like to help, and assist in me regaining some sanity around here!)